MSN has launched its new toolbar suite

MSN today launched its new Toolbar Suite, adding improved search capabilities to Windows and the Outlook email program.

(December 13 2004) MSN held a press conference today, announcing a new product. And yes, it is -- as Pandia guessed -- the beta version of a new Toolbar Suite.

The Toolbar Suite adds new search forms to various Microsoft Windows products, including the Outlook email program, the Windows Explorer and the Internet Explorer. The suite also add a search form to the Windows toolbar, making it possible to search the web as well as your computer without opening a new program.

All these programs do indeed already have search tools of their own, but to be frank: none of them are any good. The new search technology, however, is known to be very fast and efficient.

The Toolbar Suite let you search text files, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, Outlook and Outlook Express emails and attachments, as well as web pages. If you add a special Adobe plug-in you can also search PDF files.

Pandia has tested the search tool Lookout for Outlook for some time now. MSN bought Lookout earlier this year and has apparently integrated this technology into the new Toolbar Suite. Lookout is a very fast and efficient search technology indeed.

The new suite also includes a pop-up blocker and a automatic form fill feature that remembers often used personal information. Like the Google toolbar, the MSN Toolbar Suite includes a "highlighter" that colors the relevant keywords on the web results pages.

Yahoo! to follow

Yahoo! will release a similar tool in January. The Yahoo! desktop search tool will be based on X1 desktop search technology.

X1's search tool is quite expensive, but Yahoo's version will be free, just like the ones presented by Google and MSN.

Yahoo's search tool will not present the results in a web browser window, the way Google's Desktop Search does. Yahoo apparently feels that mixing old harddrive information and new web pages on that way will be confusing for searchers.

Ask Jeeves will not be left behind. They are to launch a desktop search tool later this week, while AOL should be able to launch a similar product next year.

The next incarnation of the Apple Macintosh OS X, Tiger, will also include a "total search" tool called Spotlight.

The battle for the desktop

MSN's new set of search tools is MSN's reply to the Google Desktop search tool and other tools that let you search your own computer.

The battle for your desktop is actually also a battle for your web search preferences. As soon as you start using one particular web search tool, you are also more likely to start using its embedded web search feature.

Hence users of the Google Desktop are more likely to search the web using the Google search engine. This gives Google the opportunity to serve you more relevant text ads, generating much needed revenue.

Microsoft would very much like to conquer this market, and by combining their new web search engine with a new search tool for PC files and emails they believe they have the tools needed to do this.

This is also why MSN has included a web search form in the preview version of the MSN Messenger 7.0 instant messaging program.

If MSN is able to develop a search engine that delivers search results as good as Google's, they actually might be able to dethrone Google from its position as the leading search destination in the world. After all, Google did the same one to AltaVista and Yahoo!

As Charlene Li has pointed out, searchers are not really that loyal to Google. They often use MSN or Yahoo! as their default home page. If MSN is able to deliver high quality search results, the searchers might as well stay with Microsoft.

The return of the portal

This latest development has also given new life to the portal craze of the late 1990's.

At that time search sites became gradually more complex as companies did their best to keep searchers at their own sites. Again: the objective was to be able to serve them more ads.

Google apparently won by abandoning this philosophy, serving nothing but a friendly logo and and a search form.

The truth is, however, that Google is working hard to become a portal, continuously adding new features, such as news, shopping, blog tools, photo organizer software, desktop search tools and more. And yes, there is more to come.

Hence Google knows that the company is vulnerable, and that they need to continuously innovate in order to keep your loyalty.

This is why MSN's new strategy ultimately is a good thing. It forces all the players to intensify their attempts at improving their search services. And the winner is ultimately you, the searcher.

MSN Toolbar Suite presentation and download page.
List of MSN Toolbar Suite features
FAQ MSN Toolbar Suite

See also: Google launches desktop search
The race for Total Search intensifies
Copernic gives away desktop search tool for free

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